Part 11 (1/2)

”I haven't the slightest idea.”

”Because there'll be the deuce to pay if she does,” said Coryston, nursing his knees, and bubbling with amus.e.m.e.nt. ”My unfortunate mother will have to make another will. What the lawyers have made out of her already!”

”There would be no reconciling her to the notion of such a marriage?” asked Atherstone, after a moment.

”'If my son takes to him a wife of the daughters of Heth, what good shall my life be unto me?'” quoted Coryston, laughing. ”Good gracious, how handy the Bible comes in--for most things! I expect you're an infidel, and don't know.” He looked up curiously at Atherstone.

A shade of annoyance crossed Atherstone's finely marked face.

”I was the son of a Presbyterian minister,” he said, shortly. ”But to return. After all, you know, Radicals and Tories do still intermarry! It hasn't quite come to that!”

”No, but it's coming to that!” cried Coryston, bringing his hand down in a slap on the tea-table. ”And women like my mother are determined it shall come to it. They want to see this country divided up into two hostile camps--fighting it out--blood and thunder, and devilries galore. Ay, and”--he brought his face eagerly, triumphantly, close to Atherstone's--”so do you, too--at bottom.”

The doctor drew back. ”I want politics to be realities, if that's what you mean,” he said, coldly. ”But the peaceful methods of democracy are enough for me. Well, Lord Coryston, you say you've been finding out a lot of things in these few weeks you've been settled here. What sort?”

Coryston turned an odd, deliberate look at his questioner.

”Yes, I'm after a lot of game--in the Liberal preserves just as much as the Tory. There isn't a pin to choose between you! Now, look here!” He checked the items off on his fingers. ”My mother's been refusing land for a Baptist chapel. Half the village Baptist--lots of land handy--she won't let 'em have a yard. Well, we're having meetings every week, we're sending her resolutions every week, which she puts in the waste-paper basket. And on Sundays they rig up a tent on that bit of common ground at the park gates, and sing hymns at her when she goes to church. That's No. 1. No. 2--My mother's been letting Page--her agent--evict a jolly decent fellow called Price, a smith, who's been distributing Liberal leaflets in some of the villages. All sorts of other reasons given, of course--but that's the truth. Well, I sat on Page's doorstep for two or three days--no good. Now I'm knocking up a shop and a furnace, and all the rest of the togs wanted, for Price, in my back yard at Knatchett. And we've made him Liberal agent for the village. I can tell you he's going it! That's No. 2. No. 3--There's a slight difficulty with the hunt I needn't trouble you with. We've given 'em warning we're going to kill foxes wherever we can get 'em. They've been just gorging chickens this last year--nasty beasts! That don't matter much, however. No. 4--Ah-ha!”--he rubbed his hands--”I'm on the track of that old hypocrite, Burton of Martover--”

”Burton! one of the best men in the country!” cried Atherstone, indignantly. ”You're quite mistaken, Lord Coryston!”

”Am I!” cried Coryston, with equal indignation--”not a bit of it. Talking Liberalism through his nose at all the meetings round here, and then doing a thing--Look here! He turned that man and his wife--Potifer's his name--who are now looking after me--out of their cottage and their bit of land--why, do you think?--because _the man voted for Arthur_! Why shouldn't he vote for Arthur? Arthur kissed his baby. Of course he voted for Arthur. He thought Arthur was 'a real nice gentleman'--so did his wife.

Why shouldn't he vote for Arthur? n.o.body wanted to kiss Burton's baby. Hang him! You know this kind of thing must be put a stop to!”

And, getting up, Coryston stamped up and down furiously, his small face aflame. Atherstone watched him in silence. This strange settlement of Lady Coryston's disinherited son--socialist and revolutionist--as a kind of watchman, in the very midst of the Coryston estates, at his mother's very gates, might not after all turn out so well as the democrats of the neighborhood had antic.i.p.ated. The man was too queer--too flighty.

”Wait a bit! I think some of your judgments may be too hasty, Lord Coryston. There's a deal to learn in this neighborhood--the Hoddon Grey estate, for instance--”

Coryston threw up his hands.

”The Newburys--my word, the Newburys! 'Too bright and good'--aren't they?--'for human nature's daily food.' Such churches--and schools--and villages! All the little boys patterns--and all the little girls saints.

Everybody singing in choirs--and belonging to confraternities--and carrying banners. 'By the p.r.i.c.king of my thumbs' when I see a Newbury I feel that a mere fraction divides me from the criminal cla.s.s. And I tell you, I've heard a story about that estate”--the odd figure paused beside the tea-table and rapped it vigorously for emphasis--”that's worse than any other villainy I've yet come across. You know what I mean. Betts and his wife!”

He paused, scrutinizing the faces of Atherstone and Marion with his glittering eyes.

Atherstone nodded gravely. He and Marion both knew the story. The neighborhood indeed was ringing with it. On the one hand it involved the pitiful tale of a divorced woman; on the other the unbending religious convictions of the Newbury family. There was hot champions.h.i.+p on both sides; but on the whole the Newbury family was at the moment unpopular in their own county, because of the affair. And Edward Newbury in particular was thought to have behaved with harshness.

Coryston sat down to discuss the matter with his companions, showing a white heat of feeling. ”The religious tyrant,” he vowed, ”is the most hideous of all tyrants!”

Marion said little. Her grave look followed her guest's vehement talk; but she scarcely betrayed her own point of view. The doctor, of course, was as angry as Coryston.

Presently Atherstone was summoned into the house, and then Coryston said, abruptly:

”My mother likes that fellow--Newbury. My sister likes him. From what I hear he might become my brother-in-law. He sha'n't--before Marcia knows this story!”

Marion looked a little embarra.s.sed, and certainly disapproving.

”He has very warm friends down here,” she said, slowly; ”people who admire him enormously.”